An enterprise network typically includes a Network Operations Center (NOC) that is responsible for managing a large number of wireless and wired devices which can be distributed throughout one or more physical sites which make up the enterprise network. Each physical site includes one or more logical sites, and in many cases, a NOC may be responsible for managing thousands of wireless computing devices which can be distributed among the various physical and/or logical sites that make up the enterprise network (e.g., in retail environment).
When these wireless computing devices have to be provisioned or updated with software, configuration or firmware, the wireless computing devices pull data from the NOC. As the number of wireless computing devices increases, this approach creates a large load on the network. This approach is inefficient since the NOC will often send multiple copies of same software package to the same site if there are multiple wireless computing devices of the same type at that site.
In some enterprise networks, many of the wireless computing devices are handheld mobile devices which move or “roam” between different physical and/or logical sites within the enterprise network. When a particular wireless computing device moves or roams between different physical and/or logical sites the NOC will try to provision the wireless computing device using its original Direct Connection Protocol (DCP) server at the site the device was initially assigned to. However, because the particular wireless computing device has roamed, the particular wireless computing device will no longer have a connection to its original DCP server due to network routing configuration restrictions and hence would remain unprovisioned. In some cases, software packages for a particular wireless computing device will not be available at the current site the particular wireless computing device has roamed to.
As the number of wireless computing devices increases the task on updating software running on each of the wireless computing devices becomes a complex task. In many cases, wireless computing devices that have moved from one physical and/or logical site to another physical and/or logical site will end up running old versions of software even though a newer version of the software is available for the wireless computing devices. This causes device management problems for a network administrator.
Accordingly, it is desirable to provide improved techniques for updating software running on potentially mobile devices in an enterprise network that includes a number of logical sites. Furthermore, other desirable features and characteristics of the present invention will become apparent from the subsequent detailed description of the invention and the appended claims, taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings and this background of the invention.